


Big White Mansions

by ReaderRose



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Underfell, Anger, Angst, Brotherly Angst, Brothers, Depressed Sans, EXP and LOVE (Undertale), Fights, Gen, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, Missing Persons, Papyrus actually doesn't appear, Sans Has Issues, Side Story, Swearing, Underfell Papyrus, Underfell Sans, a few others show up or get referenced, but i'm not tagging them because they aren't major parts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 06:55:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12227850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReaderRose/pseuds/ReaderRose
Summary: UNDERFELLPapyrus finally moved out. Good. Asshole.





	Big White Mansions

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TheManicMagician](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheManicMagician/gifts).



> This is part of a little series I started doing on tumblr for whatever reason. [You can read it there!](https://drundertalescum.tumblr.com/tagged/save-our-fellboy/chrono)
> 
> But you don't need the context because this is a side story.
> 
> This is NOT related to my other Underfell fics. I just like all the dark and edgy bullshit I guess

Ya know, it really seemed like just a normal fight.

 

Sans couldn't remember what this one was even about. (It was about not feeding the stupid rock, of all things. That's what it was about). They all blurred together, even when they were first starting up, because they were brothers and they were both assholes and there was nothing about them where one was alike the other besides way too much pride and a need to always be in control. Those little virtues showed up in each brother in different ways, but they always fueled the arguments further than the last time.

 

From nitpicking about socks or strategy or something more serious, their egos always got the best of them until they were both boiling over with rage whose only target was the other, and neither was that far gone just yet to let that go too far.

(But the fear was there, that they were getting there. Most would put money on Papyrus being the one to strike the first blow. It made the most logical sense. He was bigger. Stronger. Angrier. But Sans disagreed with that, ashamed as he was too think so, and he was _always_ the better gambler.)

 

So, the fights escalated, from once a month to once a week and now about every other day. And the fights escalated from petty passive aggression to aggressively aggressive aggression, because Papyrus's job stressed him out and Sans's _life_ stressed _him_ out. It used to be, they had a fight, they did a little song and dance. The silent treatment, staying in the same room but never making eye contact. They would both keep the lights on, started extra bright and intense, just to make it _clear_ they were pretending the other didn't exist. It was childish and stupid, (because they were both childish and stupid and _stubbornly so_ ), some kind of line of sight game of “I'm not touching you” that had driven pop-pops crazy back when that ol’ geezer was still around.

 

But then things escalated to avoiding the same rooms for an hour, then a day if it was bad. Then the silent treatments got longer. Then they would purposefully retreat into their own separate rooms with a purposeful door slam, because the old rituals didn't scream “angry” enough for the dramatic little shit (and Sans did it too, to demonstrate to him how dumb it was. That's why.)

And it was a slow process from a fight every few months over dirty socks, each performing dumb little antics to say “I am still kinda mad,” but it ended up with starting fights every three days because they hadn't actually talked in months, and then they would keep not taking, because they were mad.

It was so fucking stupid. What a way to let the only relationship left that mattered to them fall apart. But even though Sans couldn't remember what he was mad about this time, he was still mad about it.

 

The latest development in the art of fraternal war was to storm out of the house in some kind of rabid fury. There was even a nuance to it. Day times, especially mornings or after shift, but before the street lights switched over? That was Papyrus's hour, and he would go wherever it was he went when he was mad. (Best guess was punching a wall somewhere, or punching a person somewhere). He slammed the door hard enough to rattle the frame each time. Lunch breaks and night time where Sans’s turn. That's when he got to storm off, teleporting to show off because Papyrus didn't know how to do it too and it was an extra special kinda “fuck you”, but Papyrus usually knew where _he_ was going, the Door or the Bar, because it's not like he ever went anywhere else.

He'd leave for a few hours, come back, Papyrus would be either out at the mysterious wall-punching locale or more likely rage-cleaning the sink again and they would both not talk until the next day, if at all.

 

…

 

Was it weird that Sans had _still_ thought they were doing okay? You know, as brothers?

 

Because, you know, he didn't exactly know how to do the whole emotional thing and Papyrus was a closed book nowadays and sure they fought and sure it was getting a little scary just how much his magic screamed _threat_ when they were yelling and in the same room, but people fought. There was not a family in the Underground that didn't.

Besides, you know, the bunnies. They were tight-knit as they come and they seemed to fight pretty rarely, but judging from the brothers’ only literature on the subject, rabbits seemed to be weirdly friendly fuzzy fucks who would just walk up to people they didn't even know yet and start hugging them.  Bunnies didn't count. The drakes fought, right? Yeah, Snowy even ran off a few months ago because if it. Kid was probably dust by now. The dogs fought. Not really as much but… they did that dominance thing. Was that what _this_ was? He didn't think so. Whatever, he and the boss weren't dogs. He didn't know a lot of other families. The bears? (Never fought) The mice? Too secretive to know. The rocks? San had no idea but decided for his own sake that they never went a day without the rock-equivalent of screaming.

 

That still wasn't a lot, though, was it? So maybe it wasn't every family.

 

…Maybe he and Papyrus did fight too much.

(But it wasn't his fault. He wasn't the one who went from total sweetheart to total asshole. Sans always was the asshole; he never changed.)

 

So yeah, whatever, they fight, so what. They could fix it; they would fix it. Someday he would find a way to fix it. It was fine. They had plenty of time.

 

 

* * *

 

 

But that night after the latest fight when Sans got back from the bar, Papyrus was gone.  


It wouldn't have been weird at all if it was earlier, but being out late was dangerous and Papyrus wasn't that dumb. He didn't sleep, but he didn't go out at ungodly hours. It just wasn't done.

 

The next day Papyrus was still gone.

And the next.

 

And it dawned on Sans that Papyrus didn't _have_ to come back. He'd cleared the house of most valuables a long time ago. He had his savings. He had his job.

Papyrus didn't need to stay.

Papyrus didn't need him.

 

If Papyrus didn't want to come home he didn't have to, and he wouldn't.

Maybe this time it had gone too far. Maybe his brother wasn't coming back.

Sans did what he could: he went to work. He cleaned the kitchen. He slept a lot. He sprinkled the fucking rock. But most off all he just waited.

The asshole finally up and left, and Sans was dying inside to tell him how mad he was about it.

 

(He missed him. He was worried.)

 

* * *

 

Sans convinced himself pretty quickly that Papyrus would be fine. After all, he was strong and mean and it's not like he really needed Sans anymore.

He still waited, because he had no other plans, but he knew he moved on and he wanted to be happy for him. As usual, all he could work up was anger and resentment and apathy and sadness at the prick just moving on (and not even leaving a fucking note! Now who was the ‘rude’ one!?)

He was probably living it up in the Capital. Probably some big fancy promotion he hafn't bothered to mention, just like the last one Sans only heard about while slumped over a bar counter. God, he probably already doubled his LOVE without Sans to hold him back, and everyone knew the EXP in the city was higher. He was probably incapable of missing him now, of missing anyone, if he hadn't already been. (And he was probably so fucking proud of himself for finally shedding whatever nice or soft parts he still had left. When Sans pushed him all those years ago, he'd had no clue how far it would go. Papyrus never did anything half-assed, but Sans only did half-assed, so how was he supposed to have guessed his little brother would be such a massive prick when he grew up?)

 

Maybe the boss and Undyne had a great laugh together about how good it was that he finally ditched the weakling.

He probably had one of those big fancy New Home mansions, all to himself, no shitty, disgusting brother to muck it all up, everything perfectly arranged in those neat little boxes he loved so fucking much. Sans bet he painted the whole inside white just to show off the sparkle. Asshole. He was so much like dad and he barely even met him. Definitely didn't remember him. Pfft, he probably remembered dad more than pops or Sans at this rate.

He was finally happy wherever he was in his happy new life in his happy new job, and this backwater little town and this stupid worthless brother and these weak and miserable people could all rot while he laughed it up in New Home, dinner dates with the Captain—he wondered if her paramour ever visited too, and did she bring her fucking pets? Did they get that goo shit all over the carpets? He could imagine his brother's eyes bulging out. Or maybe they still make less of a mess of things than him?  He could picture his brother having dainty little tea parties with the King of All Monsters, with teeny little tea cups the behemoth of a monarch could barely hold while his brother stuck his pinkie out like some cultured little princess and not some state-sponsored thug who once beat a guy to death with a bone club.

 (And God _that_ whole tea party mental image was a rich one. He wished it wasn't treason to tell _that_ _one_ at comedy night).  


Sans kept the ‘old’ house clean, first as an apology, but then as an act of spite. If Papyrus ever visited, ever remembered he forgot some of his shit in the closet, he would come in and see how much Sans had his shit together, how much better the house was without him. _See, boss, I DO get things done when I say I will! I get them done faster without you telling about it you prick! I'm so much better without you, too, asshole._

Maybe the house in Snowdin would be neater than Papyrus's stupid mansion. That thought gave him some delight. Papyrus would be so busy, and the place would be so pointlessly big (because that's exactly the sort of smug asshole Papyrus was, everything needed to be the biggest and the  fanciest. He was as bad as that fucking robot who was on every fucking channel) and he wouldn't have a useless errand boy to order around when he was too busy— at least not for free. He was probably out of his mind trying to keep the stupid place sparkling on while he was off to whatever fancy job Asgore had him doing. God he was going to be so jealous when he came back to the old place. If he came back. It was Sans's best prank ever, the definition of punching up, too, so he could feel vindictive and self righteous about it (and pretend he didn't just trick himself into cleaning an empty house nobody was going to visit but himself.)

 

* * *

 

Papyrus was gone a week by the time Sans forgot that his concocted little fantasy about his brother's great new life was just that: a fantasy, when Captain Undyne burst down the door, screaming even louder than even his brother ever had.

 

**_“WHERE THE HELL IS HE!?”_ **

 

And just like that, the hopes and dreams that Papyrus moved up and on without him, safe and happy, withered away like ash in his skull and died a quick death.

It was big-deal-official and everything: Papyrus was missing. No one had seen him since the fight.

 

Sans was still _so angry_ ; it just wasn't at his brother anymore.

 

 


End file.
